Monday, March 31, 2014

APS reconsiders its position on climate — Scientific storm on the way?

Everything about associations and committees is so paralyzingly slow. But nearly four and a half years after 160 members bitterly complained about the American Physical Society (APS) statement on climate change, they are finally revisiting it, and there are very promising signs.

A paper published today in Geophysical Research Letters finds "dramatic variability" of the infrared radiative cooling of the thermosphere by carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide, "the two most important thermospheric infrared cooling agents."

Dr. Susan Crockford has a timely post on her site today about the International Union for Conservation of Nature/Species Survival Commission (IUCN/SSC) Polar Bear Species Group walking back the basis for polar bears being listed as “threatened” in the U.S.

Excerpt:

But now, in an astonishing admission, the PBSG have acknowledged that the last population survey for the SB (Regehr, Amstrup and Stirling, 2006), which appeared to register a decline in population size and reduced cub survival over time, did not take known movements of bears into account as it should have done.